Narcissistic Observations of the World that Revolves Around Me

A lot has changed since I last posted on any sort of a regular basis. Like I’ve decided to completely (as I do every now and then, just to keep you all on your toes) redesign my life.

I’ve always juggled about 8,962 different jobs, hobbies, whimsies. For the past decade or so, those have included working as an emergency dispatcher, a court reporter, an artist, and a layabout. Well, lately, I’ve been tired. Really, really, really tired. Something had to go. Obviously, ceasing to be a layabout is not an option, so I’ve decided to give up emergency dispatching. There’s something about always having to pack a lunch that makes my soul die a little every day. Plus, I’ve been getting really into sculpting lately and being a basically selfish person, I just really want to do what I want.

But working from home, while being totalllly awesome (I subsidize naps), requires a comfortable work space. This is my current setup:

Pretty, right? (Before you get too excited – it doesn’t usually look like this. There’s usually jars full of swampy paint water and lumps of dried clay all over the place.)

But see that chair? That cute flowery little chair? The one that used to be an ugly old wooden schoolmarm chair, that I painted and upholstered [badly] all by my little self?

IT IS THE DEVIL.

Do not be fooled by its adorableness. It will leave you twisted like a pretzel, bum-bruised and broken, your arms painful limp noodles from the complete lack of support. It has to go.

AND SO THE SEARCH WAS ON.

I needed to invest in myself. My future. My aging ass.

Last week, I went to visit my best friend from high school, who lives in the next province over. What better way to Prince Charming my way around the land in search of the perfect chair to fit my glass butt than a road trip?

I sat in every single chair in Moncton. I had already had the chair in mind that I wanted. Something like these:

Gorgeous, yes? And certainly better than the lump of Nazi torture device I was currently using.

Well. I found them. I sat in them.

Let’s just say it’s a good thing they’re pretty.

Then, just for the hell of it, I decided to check out a big brand-name office supply store – even though I knew there would be nothing in their selection that I would be caught dead displaying in my home.

I sat in every single one – just to prove to myself that the ugly chairs would be no more comfortable than the stylish ones. And you know what? They weren’t!

EXCEPT FOR ONE.

I knew it was different the moment my ass hit that bonded leather seat (I don’t actually know what bonded leather is, but it clearly has magical properties.)

It was like sitting in a cloud. It was like my mother’s womb, my down duvet, and the arms of John Stamos all rolled into one. It had layered body pillows, a contoured lumbar zone, and ergonomic finger controls. It was designed by people who specialize in mattresses. This was the chair.

But then I stood up and took a look at it.

IT WAS THE UGLIEST GODDAMN CHAIR IN THE WHOLE ENTIRE HISTORY OF THIS UNIVERSE AND ANY UNIVERSES AS YET UNDISCOVERED.

So….ugly.

My friend and I spent 20 minutes laughing at it and chipping away at its self-esteem – and making the pubescent sales boy fidget self-consciously. (He knew he was in trouble when he asked if he could help me and I blurted out, “Don’t you have any pretty ones?”)

I decided it was worth continuing the search. Surely there would be ONE chair somewhere that combined form with function.

So, I drove all the way back home, stopping at every store I could find. I had developed an incredible sense of efficiency by this time – stride into the store with purpose, make a beeline for the office furniture department, spend 0.4 seconds in each and every chair, make a face, stomp out of store under the stinkeye of the clerks. I did not have time for niceties. I WAS ON A MISSION.

About 3,492,248 chairs later – and several days spent in the clutches of what I had now come to think of as my ball and chain – I couldn’t stop fantasizing about that chair. That freaking hideous chair. That chair that resembles nothing quite so much as the seat of a circa-1970 Buick.

It arrives tomorrow. *sigh*

(I know you’re dying to see it. But don’t laugh at it – it’s pretty on the inside.)